Limitations of advertising on mobile

The number of people using mobile devices to connect to the Internet continues to grow, which has led advertisers to switch their focus towards getting the message out on the smaller screens. While mobile ad serving is certainly a great idea, advertisers should not be putting all their marketing eggs into one basket without serious considerations. There are some serious limitations with advertising on mobile devices, which is why it should be used as part of a comprehensive marketing campaign. Let’s take a closer look at a few of the issues that you may run into with mobile advertising:

Screen sizes

You are already aware that when you advertise on mobile devices, you have a lot less space to work with. Ad spaces are often small, can easily be missed, and can be tough for the user to navigate. Potential customers may be interested in your ad, but the tricky nature of clicking on it to get to your page can lead many to ignore the ad completely. Yes, they may be seen, but having them actually clicked on is another matter entirely. On a small touch sensitive screen, accidental clicking can also be a problem which could lead to inaccuracy in ad reports.

Conversion optimizations

When you advertise on mobile devices, you need to make sure that every step in the process, from the initial ad insertion to the landing page, and all the way to the order form is as seamless and as easy as it could be. This process requires a ton of preparation and seemingly endless testing on different mobile devices. It is a big challenge, and also costly.

Space for content

When you advertise on mobile devices, you obviously have less space to add details, descriptions and disclaimers about your product or service. At best, this means that you spend a lot of time answering the same questions from potential customers. For example: what is included and what is not included in the advertised price. At worst, you end up with misunderstandings and false assumptions, which could lead them to a negative shopping experience or avoiding your business altogether.

Slower ad loading

Not all mobile users have the latest device running on the fastest broadband network. There will be many old devices as well as slow cellular services. When this happens, the ads that you have worked so hard to create may be missed simply because they did not fully load before the user moved on to the next page or another site.

No standardized platform

Mobile ads that are based on standard web technology like HTML, CSS and JavaScript can often adapt well with web-based mobile apps. However, it can be quite different when dealing with native mobile apps because there are many available platforms, SDKs and coding frameworks. Ads that may run smoothly on one platform or device may not work on another without additional tuning and testing. If you want to reach as many people as possible, which is ultimately your goal, you need to spend a significant amount of time and money creating and testing multiple versions of the same ads. Between this and the testing for the aforementioned conversion and optimization process, you can potentially be spending days and weeks getting things ready for your mobile campaign, which means you are probably being pulled away from other more crucial aspects of your business or having to pay someone to do it for you. Either way, time and money are the two most important factors that you need to consider with a mobile ad campaign.

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